Page 34 of Up In Smoke

It could have been any of them. Luke had no idea what time it was. But to open the door and find Ivy standing there had been beyond unexpected. It convinced him that he was dreaming after the shit he'd pulled the other night—just leaving in the middle of the night. Add in that they hadn't spoken to each other since and he was still trying to figure out how to apologize, to ask if she'd kicked him out, or figure out if he'd been the asshole.

Then, she didn't say anything, had just fused her mouth to his and pressed herself against him. Her hands roaming along his bare skin had been even more convincing that it was just a dream. So he'd kissed her back.

He wasn't quite sure when he realized that it wasn't a dream, Ivy was actually there. But by then it was far too late to stop and ask questions.

Now it became clear, as their breathing leveled out and she squirmed beside him, that she was about to get up and walk away. She was tucked in the crook of his arm, her head against his shoulder, and he tightened her against him, this time doing what he should have last time. “Stay.”

Her fingers clenched against his side, but at least she stopped acting as if she was about to roll over and say something about a good time but she couldn’t … “Luke. I know you won’t believe me, but I didn’t come over here for this.”

He chuckled, unable to fight the rumble that started low in his chest. She could have fooled him.

“I had things to tell you but—”

“You saw me and you couldn't resist me?” he teased, rolling his head toward her and watching as she rolled away, unwilling to look him in the eyes. His stomach growled and he felt more than heard her slight laughter.

“Food,” he declared, adding, “and unlike you, I don't just happen to have a roast chicken with all the trimmings about ready to come out of the oven.”

She shook her head against him, her hand coming up and splaying flat across his chest and making him forget what he was hungry for. “That was pure coincidence.”

She shifted slightly as she spoke so he turned onto his side, keeping his one arm behind her. He moved the other to drape it across her hip. This time, he was going to make sure that no one fled.

“I'm sorry I left the way I did last time.” His voice was low and full of gravel. Apologies didn't come easy, but he also knew if he didn't say it, it would hang forever between them. And he liked this—the nakedness of it, the lack of space between them.

She still didn't look at him. Again, she shook her head as if to shake it off. “That wasn't just you. I freaked out. I practically pushed you out the door. I mean, I don't need my neighbors seeing you leaving in the morning.”

This time he laughed out loud. “So it was better for them to see me leaving in the middle of the night with hair that clearly said what we’d been up to?”

That at least made her eyes snap up to his. “Really?”

“Yes, but it was dark.” He shrugged it off now, though he had initially intended to make her understand that the neighbors probably had figured it out. Now, he didn't want her to think that because it obviously worried her. For a woman who spouted the things she had, throwing her past at him as though it would hurt, she sure was concerned about what her neighbors might think. Leaning forward, he kissed her again, in the soft, casual way that he hoped conveyed he wanted something more than just this late night need. He wanted to be more than just an itch that Ivy Dean scratched.

She kissed him back and leaned in, her simple touch making him want her again. He felt the change when she pulled back. “There are things that I have to tell you.”

He nodded, understanding she meant the things that were in the bag that she brought with her. Important information. “I have things I need to tell you, too.”

She nodded softly as though waiting for him to tell her.

“I want more than this sneaking around. I want more than getting kicked out at two a.m. with my T shirt on inside out.”

“It wasn't two a.m.,” she protested.

“You know what I mean. I was hoping you would go out on an actual date with me.” His heart pounded. How long had it been since he'd done anything other than hook up? How long had it been since he'd been with the same person more than once?

He laid there naked in bed, still smelling the scent of sex between them and the silence stretched out as he waited for Ivy to answer.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

“Ifeel like I'm being watched.”

Luke tried not to let the shock show at her words. Ivy sat at his old cheap table in an old cheap chair that looked like it had been stolen from his mother's first home. Ivy's place—even burned out—had been in better shape than this.

They sat in front of bowls of cereal. She'd not really turned him down, but she’d not agreed to a date either, saying only, “I don't know. With everything going on between us, I'm not sure it's the right thing to do.”

Now he was hung up on that idea. Though he was listening to her, at the same time, he was trying to figure out how to get her to say yes. But this? It grabbed all of his attention. “What do you mean?”

She pushed the small, half-eaten bowl of cereal away. He kept this place warm and right now, he was enjoying the benefits of that as she sat there in only her underwear and one of his t shirts. She was wearing his clothes, eating his cereal, in his shitty apartment in the middle of the night.

They should be dating. But again her words pulled him back to the present with fear.

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